


Fester

by tysonrunningfox



Series: Festerverse [1]
Category: How to Train Your Dragon (Movies)
Genre: Adultery, Angst, F/M, original kid characters, seventeen measures of angst
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-10-02
Updated: 2016-10-02
Packaged: 2018-08-19 01:27:07
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 14,280
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8183672
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/tysonrunningfox/pseuds/tysonrunningfox
Summary: Fifteen years ago, Astrid imagined something different for her life. Eret/Astrid, Hiccup/OC, Hiccup/Astrid. Bring your tissues.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Ok, this idea bit me and had to be written down, and now it's brewing a potential sequel that I'm really excited about and…well, guard yourself.
> 
> Do you have your tissues? Do you have your open mind? If you answered yes to both of these questions, read on.

00000

Fifteen years ago, Astrid stopped yelling for long enough to try to kiss him and he flinched away. Fifteen years ago, what had always been strong and pure faltered. Fifteen years ago, their lives separated and it was for the better, it was what they both wanted.

00000

Astrid wakes up like every other morning, baby starting to sniff in the crib as her husband clamps well-muscled arms around her waist and tries to keep her from leaving the bed. She laughs and kisses his forehead, covered with undone black hair, kisses the blue lines of his tattoos. He reluctantly lets her go and she gets the baby, three months old and finally starting to look like her above that already familiar strong chin. He coos at her and latches onto her breast as she tucks his warm little body underneath her loose night tunic and shuffles to the kitchen.

Stormfly sticks her beak in the open window in greeting as Astrid cuts up yesterday's leftover bread and sets it on the table along with a dish of yak butter and a jar of apple preserves. Something feels different in the air today and she glances out of the window, repositioning the baby against her arm and looking for clouds, anything that would clue her into the strange texture of the air. It's a beautiful blue sky, but storms on Berk often don't give much warning.

She doesn't have to wake the other children, they come pattering out into the main room, six year old Rolf and three year old Ingrid, both sandy blonde and disheveled as they hug her legs in greeting. She bends down and they both kiss their little brother good morning before Eret helps little Ingrid into her chair and starts buttering her bread for her. Astrid is content leaning back against the counter and taking in the scene, Stormfly's early morning squawking comforting behind her.

00000

The Night Fury flies over Astrid's house a little before noon, followed by an unfamiliar purple dragon and she can't help but look this time, turning away from hanging up the wash to watch the newcomer's delicate indigo tail flutter in the wind behind it. It looks like Hiccup brought back a rider this time and she can't help but be curious, can't help but wonder what he found out there, who he found.

Her linens try to float away on the wind and she hustles to pin them to the drying line, relishing in Rolf and Ingrid's sparkling laughter from Stormfly's back as the Nadder gives them a careful ride around the lodge, wings held aloft for long, smooth hops.

00000

Eret gets back from the fishing boats early, slumped and tired on Skullcrusher's sloped shoulders and kisses Astrid hello, tipping her backwards with a laugh and ruffling their son's thick black hair, barely sticking out from the sling that holds him against Astrid's chest. The man gets distracted, lips lost against his wife's neck until the kids are giggling again and running out with their mother's drive, insisting daddy throws them in the air before anything else happens.

But tonight isn't the night for playing, and Eret remembers why he's home early, telling his wife that there's a meeting and a feast in town tonight to celebrate the chief's return. He doesn't need to hold Astrid's hand anymore when he talks about the chief, and she directs him towards clean, dry clothes with a wry grin that means she'll be watching him change.

They finally manage to get all the kids dressed and get decent themselves before piling onto two dragons and starting the slow, leisurely flight to the town center.

Astrid settles for the middle of the crowd, like she's done for the past decade, since fighting with the chief lost its luster, and Eret holds the older kids hands, chatting with one of the other fishermen while Hiccup says something to Gobber in the forge. She can't see much of the chief, aside from a few tufts of reddish hair poking above Gobber's hat, and she can't help but notice that it's starting to turn silver in places, much earlier than his father's turned. Stoick had that ruddy mane until his late forties, and Astrid still thinks it was the dragons that did him in.

For Hiccup it's probably one of the countless adventures she hasn't heard about.

The baby starts crying, and she pats Eret's shoulder, letting him know that she's leaving to let the little one nurse. He's been hungrier than the other two ever were, but it already seems like he's taking more after his father, little hands so strong it almost hurts her finger when he grips it.

Astrid is halfway out of the crowd when Hiccup starts talking, telling some story about the Southern Lands that makes the whole tribe laugh. She can hear blips of his voice through the cacophony, something about dragons and fights and failed treaties. Something about the purple dragon she noticed earlier, what must be the name of its rider.

Married.

She whips around, clutching her still crying baby against her chest and looking through the crowd in front of her at ridiculous, gray-haired Hiccup with his arm around a feisty looking twenty something red-head with a broad, confident grin.

00000

Her name is Isabella and she speaks Norse with a strange thick accent. She's vibrant and crazy, and her dragon can open a cask of strange, foreign wine with one flick of its glitzy blue talon. She touches Hiccup like she can't help it, small hands on his chest, his back, his arms, his hands. Weaving through his hair like she doesn't notice the silver.

Astrid forces herself to look away and raises another piece of mutton to Ingrid's mouth, giving her a stern face and gesturing to the little girl's half-full plate.

"Come on, sweetie, one more bite." The girl shakes her head and yawns, rubbing small, chubby fists over her eyes. "One more bite and you can be done." Ingrid glares at her mother, gray eyes narrow and familiar, refusing that last bandage on a wound. Refusing an early morning flight on a day off. She kisses her daughter's head as soon as she swallows the last bite of mutton and turns to curl up against her father's side. Eret pats her back and lifts her with one big hand, setting the girl on his lap.

Astrid looks back towards the front of the room, where Hiccup has his arm around Isabella, fingers tangled in waist length ruby tangles. She takes another sip from her tankard of deep plum wine and grimaces at the sweetness, a fruit she hasn't tasted that hasn't been missing from her life. Hiccup is red-faced and laughing and she looks away again, checking on Rolf, who's leaning against Eret's other side and nibbling on one last carrot. The baby has been asleep for a while, tucked tight to her chest, so unbearably warm and sweet.

"What's the matter, beautiful?" Eret leans over to whisper in her ear and Astrid smiles, leaning into the warm breath.

"Oh, nothing. Just…feeling a little cooped up." She simplifies, because telling him that she hates the wine would only make him fetch her some ale. And while it's wonderful that her husband is the kind of man who tries to fix the things she hates, sometimes she just wants to hate things. She takes another sip of wine, and it's no better, no less sweet and almost syrupy on her tongue.

"How about I get the older ones to bed and meet you at home?" He nuzzles the soft spot behind her ear and hinting that they'll finish what they started earlier when she helped him change. She smiles and pats his knee under the table before stopping to toy with Ingrid's little boot and making the sleepy little girl squirm and laugh.

"You are the best," she turns her head to kiss him, a hint of what's to come as he pulls away with that smirk, still deliciously smug somehow after ten years. She bites her lip and he leans in to kiss her and she wonders if they should start talking to the builders about adding onto the house. Again. "I'll be home in a bit, alright?"

"Can't wait," he grins and stands, holding Rolf's hand and easily hoisting Ingrid up on an arm. "Oh! And before I forget, do you think you can talk to the chief about naming the little man soon?" Astrid ruffles the baby's hair on impulse, combing her fingers through the fine black strands. "The baby is starting to lose its charm."

"Oh," she glances again towards the front of the room, towards Isabella and Hiccup, kissing in front of a raucously drunk crowd. "I don't think it's really the right time."

"You'd rather interrupt their honeymonth, then?" Astrid glowers at the table.

"I do owe him one."

She remembers ten years ago, hiding under the furs and laughing while her shirtless new husband answered the door to an awkward looking Hiccup, asking to borrow Stormfly for Nadder training. She hadn't really noticed him at the ceremony, so caught up in her and Eret's little world, but in that moment she realized that he'd seen her bedhead first and his was the first bed she slid into giggling.

That visit ruined a solid day of her otherwise glorious honeymonth, and she's tempted to reenact it with a shrieking, nameless baby in tow.

"I'd like to get him named sooner rather than later," he kisses her one last time before adjusting his grip on Ingrid and making his way to the door, reminding Rolf to hold his hand tightly through the drunken crowd.

"We're not naming him Eret Jr." Astrid shouts over her shoulder and hears half of her husband's laugh before it's entirely overtaken by the crowd.

She finishes the tankard of too sweet wine, sucking on her teeth and trying to dispel the taste. Someone offers her some more and she turns it down, drumming her fingers against the table and cringing at her uneven fingernails. She hasn't filed them in what must be weeks, and it jumps to the top of her agenda. After talking to the chief about naming.

They could have had Spitelout do it while he was gone, probably even Gobber, but Eret trusts Hiccup more with these things. They waited six months to name Ingrid for the same reason and it drove them absolutely insane.

But Hiccup looks so preoccupied, arms around Isabella, holding her against his chest and whispering in her ear. She's short enough that he has to stoop and Astrid idly wonders if the hunchback is aging him as much as the graying hair. She snorts and looks away, again, checking on her sleeping son and touching his perfect little nose with the tip of her finger. He really does look like his father except for that nose, upturned slightly and soft in his already strong-featured face. Her mother already says he's going to be a ladykiller, but Astrid hopes not. She hopes he has far bigger dreams.

When she looks up from his sleeping face, Hiccup has his tongue down Isabella's throat and they're saying what must be an unbelievably heartfelt goodbye half in Norse and half in some strange chirpy language Astrid doesn't recognize. The hall is starting to empty, and she assumes that the wine ran out. Isabella gives Hiccup one last kiss, laughing and whispering something in his ear that makes him flush before nearly dancing off with Phlegma, purple shimmery dragon fluttering at her heels. Hiccup grins after her for a second before running his hand back through his silvering hair and turning to look around the hall.

His eyes lock on Astrid and she freezes for a moment before waving and standing, cradling the baby close with a hand on the back of his head. Hiccup falters, eyes catching on the bundle like he absolutely forgot she'd have a baby. He probably did, and that makes it easier somehow, chief and citizen.

"Hey, Astrid, what's up?" He asks, still flushed with that ghost of a smile haunting his face as he weaves between the tables towards her, stopping on the other side of her long bench.

"Oh, nothing—" the pleasantries sting, fake and chirping, and she wishes she were at home, open and comfortable. "We need a naming ceremony for the little one, hopefully before the wedding, he's three months already." She rocks his sleeping form slightly, holding him close to her chest. "Oh, and congratulations by the way. On the wedding."

"Congratulations yourself," he grins, the plastic chiefly grin that she used to make fun of in another era. It hasn't changed, even though the rest of his face is different, windchapped and heavily freckled, silver streaks running through still boyish hair around his face. She doesn't think she's seen him this close since Ingrid was the resident baby. "Three months, huh?" He leans in a little closer, looking down at that tuft of black hair. She doesn't think she's ever seen him look at a baby so closely, and maybe Isabella really is the lucky one, settling Hiccup down.

"Do you want to hold him?" And it's almost an accidental offer, but her hands are carefully lifting the sleeping babe out of its sling and holding him in her arms with a gentle, practiced bounce.

"May I?" He holds his hands out and she carefully sets the baby in his arms, shushing him gently as he squirms in his sleep before curling into Hiccup's chest, still and quiet. "He's quite the sleeper."

"Already sleeping through the night," she's filled with motherly pride.

"He looks a lot like his father."

"Except for the nose," she points out too proudly and Hiccup nods.

"The nose is all you," he rocks the baby, a bit uneven, and she starts to feel strange, cold without the baby in his sling. "What are you thinking about names?"

"Eret, son of Eret, if you ask my husband," she laughs, "but that's not happening. I like Arvid, after my grandfather."

"Arvid Hofferson, I think we can handle that, huh big guy?" He coos to the baby, and all she can see is a little red-headed child latched onto his young wife. The kid will probably be adorable. "Uh, tomorrow morning, I have a meeting with the council," he steps around the end of the table to offer her the baby, obviously nervous to hand him anywhere. Astrid takes him back with a shush and tucks him back into his sling, cosy and comfortable with his warm weight against her front. "But if you and Eret come by around noon, I should be free."

"Thanks," she nods, backing up a step before edging forward around him and pausing to look over her shoulder. "And seriously, congratulations."

He smiles again, frozen at twenty beneath tired eyes and silvering hair.

00000

Arvid likes his name, if a three month old baby can like his name, and a week later he oversleeps for the first blissful time. It makes Eret late for the boat and he's dashing out the back door with his pants half on, Astrid laughing after his white rear in the sunlight as she retrieves the finally hungry baby from his crib and goes to wake the other kids.

She's finding something for breakfast while Rolf and Ingrid yawn and rub their eyes at the table when someone knocks at the door. She swears under her breath and tugs her sleep shift over Arvid's head, unwilling to tug the baby away from his breakfast and cause a tantrum before looking out the window.

Hiccup is at the door, hair more red than brown in the sunshine and she bites back a louder curse, bouncing Arvid slightly and peeking her head out of the window to talk to him.

"It's not really a good time, chief, what do you need?"

"Ok, when is a good time?"

"Probably not today," she tries to brush him off, but he cocks his head, hair shifting sideways and revealing a silver glimmer along the roots. He looks old, she probably looks old too. "Overslept." She simplifies, and from the way he looks away, it's too private, too much information.

It's still so easy to do that with him, it's the slip she never quite recovered. Anyone else in the village asks her something and she winds around the question, keeping her strong face to the wind. Hiccup gleans the truth from her without even trying, but she's done hating him for it. It made her miserable enough for those long five years she wrestled with herself.

"Not this afternoon or—"

"We're in the middle of breakfast, chief. Can I come into town later, or something? If this is really that important."

"I haven't eaten yet," he says it like an offer, like he's giving her something, breakfast with the chief. His eyes say otherwise, almost nervous even as he squints against the sun.

"Let—I'll go get dressed and be right back," she sighs, nearly stalking back to her bedroom and changing, staring wistfully at her armor for a moment before passing over it for a practical dress. She wore the armor the entire time Rolf was a baby, and it ended in far too many bonked heads to really be practical.

But right now, she could use the extra layer of protection.

Arvid is fussy, exactly why she didn't want to cut his late breakfast short and she burps him onto a rag on her shoulder as she opens the front door, waving Hiccup inside and turning to the two older kids at the table.

"Say hi to the chief," they both wave and Hiccup takes an awkward seat at the head of the table. She almost asks him to move, because that's her husband's seat and it looks too strange, but Arvid starts fussing harder, little fists clenching and unclenching in the fabric of her dress. "Oh, hey, you're alright," she coos to him, searching through the cupboards one-handed for something for breakfast.

"Someone isn't so happy this morning," Hiccup comments and when Astrid glances at him, he's waving at a shy Ingrid, who's hiding her face in her dress and peeking out from blonde bangs with one gray eye.

"He had his breakfast cut short," she bounces the baby against her hip and finding half a loaf of bread and a small basket of fish jerky. "Sorry, we don't have much, we're going to the market tomorrow." She offers the explanation as a pleasantry and retrieves the dish of yak butter, setting it in the middle of the table and setting about slicing the bread with a dagger someone left on the counter. It feels like Eret's, distinctive grip worn into the handle.

"Do you want me to hold him?" Hiccup offers as she struggles on the last slice, shushing the fussy baby and trying to keep the dagger sawing smoothly.

"It's fine." Again, with the pleasantries. Mostly, she doesn't want to deal with the shrieking upset baby that'll come out as soon as she hands him off, and she wishes she could just tell him that.

'Hiccup, you don't know what you're doing and he'll start wailing.'

Not Hiccup. Chief.

She's glad she stuck with the typical answer.

"Looks like you've got this down anyway."

It's too complimentary, reaching, and she can't quite restrain her scathing look. "No sarcasm, I'm just impressed. I can barely make breakfast two handed."

"Well, that's not something you have to worry about for that much longer."

She sits at the other end of the table and starts buttering two slices of bread, cutting them in half and setting them in front of the kids.

"Am I going to stop eating breakfast?" He deadpans and Rolf snickers, chewing on a nibble of crust.

"You're getting married, probably handing off the breakfast duties." He stares at the table for a moment before grabbing a slice of dry bread for himself. "What? Is she marrying you for your cooking skills?"

"Nothing like that," he shakes his head and gestures towards her. "It's just strange seeing you like this."

"Married? A mom?" She searches for clarification, wishing for that armor like nothing else. "It didn't exactly happen overnight, you know. It's been ten years in the making."

"Why don't you come to village meetings anymore?" She wonders what brought this on, why he's suddenly here asking her this.

"Is that why you urgently needed to have breakfast with me? To ask why I don't come to meetings?" She bounces Arvid, kissing his baby-smooth forehead and shushing him.

"I—with Isabella…I've been thinking a lot about what happened to us, and I don't want it to happen again," he glances at her and her kids, and her hearth.

"With Isabella."

"Exactly," he nods.

"We broke up, it happens," Astrid looks over at Rolf, who's listening a little too intently, already a little too bright for his own good. Ingrid seems absolutely captivated by Hiccup, smiling and snickering whenever he glances her way.

It's Ingrid the little flirt who's going to keep her up at night, isn't it?

"We…exploded."

"I can't do this right now," she glances again at Rolf, who sheepishly looks away from the conversation like he hasn't been eavesdropping. "You're welcome to finish your breakfast but—" Arvid's fussing kicks up a notch and she mutters a prayer under her breath, wishing for five minutes of peace to let the grumpy baby eat.

"How about Isabella watches the older kids for a few hours?" His face lights up when he says her name and Astrid bites back a retort about not needing a babysitter. "She's great with kids."

"This is going to take a few hours?"

"I'll fly them over on Toothless, they'll love it."

"Hiccup," she admonishes, and it strikes her that she can't remember the last time she said his name out loud. "I don't get why you think this is so necessary, we have nothing to talk about. It was years ago, we've both grown up."

"We—" he sighs, and Rolf watches him like a hawk, waiting for that ride on a Night Fury. The kid spends too much time with Fishlegs and the book of dragons. "You used to be my best friend."

"Is this really going to take hours?" Astrid repeats her question, thinking about the pile of laundry in the bedroom, the dozens of dirty cloth diapers piled in the tub of lye water out back.

"I just want to understand."

The curiosity is oddly welcome, unlike the rest of this situation.

"Are you sure your intended can handle these two?" She ruffles Rolf's hair as the boy starts to bounce excited in his seat.

"Absolutely."

00000

When Hiccup comes back after dropping her kids with Isabella, Astrid is outside of her house, daily batch of diapers hung to dry while Arvid lays on a soft blanket in the grass, small hands bracing against the ground while he lifts his head and mouths a few brightly stained wooden toys, covered in bite marks from Ingrid's teething. Stormfly rushes to greet Toothless, and the two nod like its old times.

That was the hardest part, telling Stormfly no. Of course the dragon still snuck off for a while to see her friend, and Astrid awoke to Toothless outside of her house a few times, but even that eventually petered to nothing. Skullcrusher is fun too, or at least annoying him is fun, and Stormfly isn't without company.

"What do you want to understand?" Astrid doesn't look at him, focused on nudging Arvid with the red cube he thought he lost, smiling when he snatches it from her and smacks it against the ground.

"He's already got quite the arm," Hiccup dodges the question, sitting down on the other side of the spread blanket. "And he's holding his head up."

"I sort of want to understand your sudden fascination with babies," Astrid laughs and shakes her head. "I distinctly remember Earwax asking you to hold her little girl, and you looked like you'd been hit over the head with a hammer."

"Marriage," he shrugs, staring down at Arvid as he gnaws on a green ball with slick pink gums.

"If there's something you want to talk about, just spit it out." She hates that she knows what he means by his tone, that she can still remember what Hiccup-brand trepidation sounds like, its identification ingrained too deeply in her brain to wash away.

"Why did you stop coming to town meetings?"

"It was better for the village," she reaches out to adjust the baby's diaper and tug him gently back towards the center of the blanket. "I was too angry with you and you wouldn't listen to anything I had to say, even if it was a good idea."

"Well then, how have we lasted this long without your great ideas?" He snarks, self-conscious and she rolls her eyes.

"You think I'd let anything fall apart? Snotlout relays the message."

"So it wasn't his idea for fish storage in that glacier?" He sits up straighter, some great mystery solved and Astrid rolls her eyes. "I knew that was a bit much coming from him."

"And Gobber, and Eret." She wonders if it sounds bad that Eret came last and amends herself. "But those are more our ideas than my ideas."

"I've been running a puppet government," he furrows his brow and straightens a corner of the blanket. She doesn't recognize his foot, it's a new model, impossibly sleeker, less moving parts, and she wonders if servicing the other one became a problem too far from Berk.

"What did you really want to talk about?" She's starting to feel uneasy with him here, ten years ago all over again before she learned to back off and fight her battles another day. Before Eret taught her.

"Where did we go wrong?"

"That's a bit of a loaded question, isn't it?" She glances over her shoulder towards the water, searching the horizon for a fishing boat and Skullcrusher resting on deck. "I don't even know if I remember, it was so long ago and we were so young."

"You were trying to help, but it felt like I couldn't breathe, like being chief was going to kill me."

"I knew you could do it," she shrugs. "Especially with everyone's help. The only problem is that you didn't want help."

"And you started yelling at me to ask for help," he accuses her and she rolls her eyes, fixing Arvid's tiny tunic.

"It's a little late to play the blame game, don't you think?" She waits before looking up at him and sighing. "I yelled, you yelled, I called you a coward and you said I had a stick up my ass. We were kids who had to be adults all of a sudden."

"It's that simple for you?" He asks, staring at the baby. Arvid totters on one hand and falls to his stomach, grunting and looking towards his mom with a bobbly too big head. She ruffles his head and offers him a wooden yellow block, which he promptly sticks in his mouth.

"Look, Hiccup," she sighs and falters, because what she's about to say doesn't feel true anymore, even if it is. "I'm thirty five, I'm married, I have kids, I—we were just such a long time ago, it was a different world, and—"

"You wonder if it was real, or if we were just caught up in some crazy, juvenile romance?" He fills in her thoughts perfectly, better than she would have and she swallows hard.

"Exactly."

"It would have been easy to marry you that summer," he winces at the thought and Astrid stares at Arvid's perfect little chubby arms. "But I didn't."

"No, you didn't. Can't we just accept that it's probably for the best?" She sounds a little too desperate, a little too emphatic and Arvid fusses, cuing on the pitch of her voice.

"But I don't understand why we had to scream at each other for five years."

"I still don't understand why you want to talk about this, Hiccup." She shakes her head and stands, fiddling with the half dry diapers and rearranging them to follow the sun. "Isabella isn't me, that's why you two are getting married." She bites her tongue and pauses, the moment too close and tight in her chest. "How did you two meet, anyway?"

In those five years of fighting, she pointedly never asked about his adventures, instead presenting him with a heap of viable documents at the dock and talking through them in measured tones that never quite disguised the fact that he made her want to yank her hair out. She never wanted to know everywhere he'd been, everything he'd seen. All the women he'd met.

It took her so long to get over him, and she resents her own inability to move on more than all those times they yelled. All those times they fell back into bed even when they were long through.

She knows now how hard those five years were on Eret, he already felt for her, he hated seeing her tear herself up. All that time she spent letting Hiccup fester, she could have been healing with Eret.

"I was down really far south and got into trouble with some pirates. This crazy cloud of red flew in and started giving it to them, and I wasn't anywhere near fluent in the language, but I could pick out a few choice swears," he smiles, "and these big guys were cowering, I learned later that it was her big brother and he was supposed to send the cute ones her way to scam."

"She scammed you?" Astrid sits back down and checking the baby's diaper, because of course he always makes another as soon as she's done with the laundry.

"She tried. I didn't have any money, but I offered to help her with a dragon problem in exchange for the rescue. Of course I still didn't know that the pirate was her brother. She took me up on the offer, that's how we found Aurora, her dragon, the sneaky thing had been breaking into her house." He smiles at the memory, tapping his foot on the ground. "I stayed there about a month and she informed me she was coming home with me. But of course 'home' and 'marriage' sound a whole lot alike, I proposed and…here we are."

"That's quite the story to tell your grandkids," she laughs and sits back down. Her story isn't as exciting, it's all long flights where she yelled at the wind and Eret listened, and a routine spar that turned into something more. Village meetings where he dragged her away by her wrist and held her against the wall until she calmed down and amped back up for an entirely different reason.

It's a story the grandkids probably can't hear until they're grown themselves.

"I never thought it'd happen to me, that's for sure," he's still grinning, like the wind is in his hair and he just leapt off of Toothless, and something in her chest twangs, unwilling to be forgotten.

"Me either." The conversation lulls and Astrid squints at the sky again, idly searching the horizon. "When is the wedding?"

"Six days now," he grins. "She's staying with Phlegma until then…hey, you two should get to know each other." She looks a little shocked at the idea, but Hiccup is unfazed. "Because I'd really like to be able to say we're friends again, Astrid. Maybe the actual puppet master can show herself instead of using Snotlout."

She punches his arm, it's a reflex that tingles all the way to her shoulder.

"Snotlout fit the glove better."

"No, Astrid, he didn't."

00000


	2. Chapter 2

00000

Isabella is effervescent. Her hair seems to pick up all the light in the room and cast it back out, orange and bronze and on fire. Her laugh is fresh and bubbly in young pink cheeks. She's twenty four, and her Norse is thick and sometimes slightly wrong, making her laugh freely and babble to Hiccup in another language for a moment to ask for help.

Astrid has never felt older or more boring, baby strapped to her chest as Isabella tells her how wonderful her children are, how the three of them explored the woods together, behind the Haddock lodge and found strange carvings in a few old trees. How Rolf is so smart and could read her Hiccup's name carved into the bark.

And she's full of stories, she's full of adventure and life, and all the places she's been. The golden sweeping deserts of the south she coasted by on a sailboat she stole from some soldiers. She's not a killer though, she puts baby birds back in nests and insists on drinking more of that sweet, fruity wine that couldn't kill inhibitions.

Astrid refuses the beverage with the excuse of the baby and Hiccup nods at her strangely, a smile she doesn't quite recognize quirking at the corner of his mouth as he pushes his own tankard away. She remembers when she used to joke that she'd be stuck with all the mead on their own honeymonth because he couldn't handle the gooey sweet.

"Oh, Hic-cop, you should probably be home taking Aztreed," Isabella smiles fondly at little Arvid, running delicate fingers down the still sharp line of Hiccup's jaw. "The baby should sleep in he crib."

"Do you need a ride home?" Hiccup half stands, kissing Isabella's temple on the way up like he can't stand not touching her for fifteen minutes. Maybe he can't.

They're lucky, really. She hopes it lasts. She does.

Even if it sticks the legendary chief Hiccup Haddock with syrupy sweet wine for the rest of his life.

"I can walk, it's a nice night," she stands and shrugs, holding the sleeping baby quiet against her front.

"Walking with her, you can't let her go all by herself," Isabella shoves playfully light on Hiccup's side and he laughs, looking down at her with that rose glow gaze. Astrid doesn't take the chance to explain that she's not fragile just because she's a mother, because it seems unlikely they'd hear her anyway.

"Really, I don't need you to."

Isabella giggles something in her native tongue and Hiccup's cheeks flush an excited pink before he climbs out of the bench almost too quickly, stumbling over his metal foot and making her laugh harder.

"It's no problem at all, Astrid," he grins at Isabella before leaning down and whispering something in her ear, strange syllables slipping past into the air of the room. Astrid wonders if he sounds as wrong as she does, and if Isabella is laughing at him.

Her small, pale hand lands so softly against his and Astrid looks away, fully sure that her laughing has nothing to do with his dialect.

"I'm leaving either way."

Astrid makes her exit, fully expecting to find herself walking alone towards her lodge. Hiccup jogs up behind her a second later, still flushed and red but smile fading as he pats his leg and Toothless falls into step beside them.

"Sorry about that."

"Ah, young love," Astrid laughs as Toothless snuffles around her, puffing hot air against Arvid's head before pressing his broad triangular head against her side. "Someone is a fan of babies."

"I think he missed you," Hiccup suggests, and he's not smiling anymore, and it's every reason she's glad that things ended like they did. He isn't smiling and she walks a little faster, wishing that he'd let her take the trip alone.

"I missed him too," she scratches behind Toothless's ear flap and his tongue lolls sideways out of his mouth.

"I don't think Stormfly feels the same," he snorts, "she ran and hid behind a tree when I walked up this morning."

"She's sensitive," Astrid defends. "And Eret brings her more chicken than you ever did."

The reference to them, to when he was her Eret, or could have been, feels taboo and she wishes the night would swallow it up. Even walking with Hiccup feels abysmally natural, the way that her ear never noticed the odd uneven cant of his footsteps until she thought about it, somehow still used to the cadence after all this time.

"You two really are happy." He says it like a promise, like a far off horizon he's finally reaching towards, that one direction he never wanted to explore before.

"Most days, which is all you can really ask for," Astrid answers honestly, as a friend. "Sometimes he's a pain, and sometimes I'm hard to live with but…we're happy."

"I used to hate you for being happy." He admits, "but…but it's what was supposed to happen, isn't it?"

"I thought you didn't believe in fate."

"I was young," he shrugs, shoulders close to his ears in that sheepish way that transports her to first dates eons ago. "Fate has pulled me out of a lot of scrapes since then."

"If you want to tell me about your adventures, just do it," she nudges his shoulder with hers and it's almost habit. "Don't make me ask."

"Oh no, that's not what I was trying to do," he laughs. "I bet you've heard all of the cool ones anyway, the ones about pirates and thieves and people who generally wanted to kill me."

"Those aren't the cool ones," Astrid rolls her eyes, "like we don't get enough pillaging around here. I like the ones about different things, different lands and people and…trees," she decides after a moment, staring up at the green pines, dotted surreptitiously with the occasional flat leaf branch. "Because all the forests in the world can't look like this one."

"Hmm, trees," he looks intrigued at the challenge, she can see the baby-faced ghost of a sixteen year old boy figuring out an invention in his face and looks away, adjusting the baby's sling. "In Autumn, there are whole forests that turn red and yellow and orange, so bright it looks like they're on fire. And all the leaves are falling off while they're colored, so if you aren't careful, you get massive stinging welts from bright red leaves all over your face." He laughs and almost elbows her, missing slightly with the cadence of their steps. "But I'm assuming you're not interested in the thieves who chased me through an orange forest."

"Not really," she shrugs and looks at the glowing windows of her house appearing at the top of the hill. The front room is dark except for what looks like glowing coals from the hearth, but the bedroom window shines yellow against the darkening sky. "I'm sure I can make it from here," she turns to him and backs up a step, scratching Toothless' nose beside her hip. "Plus, I'm not an idiot, you have somewhere to be."

He flushes and rubs the back of his neck and she wonders if he still has that freckle smack dab in the middle of his ass.

"That I do."

"I guess that's the thing about being chief, you don't have to wait four more days."

"It's not like you waited," he shrugs off the embarrassment like she cares if he mentions them. She cocks her hip.

"It was a joke."

"I guess I'm used to telling those," he apologizes with his eyes, with the way he backs off a step and looks away from her. She almost asks about the freckle, she almost asks if he's wondering about her scars.

"Goodnight, Hiccup."

"Goodnight," he waves her off and starts back down the hill, waiting briefly for Toothless to finish saying goodbye to Astrid. She doesn't watch him go, there's nothing to see out here, and suddenly nothing sounds better than the warm side of the bed, which Eret almost always reluctantly hands over.

She slips into the bedroom through the back door, and Eret is just climbing into bed, shirtless and stretching, old white scar contorting strangely as he reaches his arms above his head. He smiles when he sees her, standing back up and holding his arms out for Arvid, taking the sleeping baby and rocking him against his chest for a moment before settling him down in the crib.

"Did you have fun?"

"Fun isn't exactly what I'd call it," Astrid admits, slipping out of the sling and tugging her dress over her head, turning and pulling her hair over her shoulder so that Eret can make quick work of the ties to her wrappings. He kisses the nape of her neck after loosening the garment and steps back so she can pull it over her head without elbowing him in the face. Again.

He hands her one of his clean tunics and she pulls it on, sighing at the soft familiar clothing and climbing into bed next to him, settling into her spot in the nook of his shoulder.

"Don't tell me you started arguing with the chief again."

"Not at all," Astrid shakes her head and uses his collarbone to scratch her nose. "I—Isabella is just so much younger than us, and she's done so much. I just felt old; it's exhausting."

"Well, it could be worse, you could be having to keep up with her for the rest of your life." He snorts and kisses the top of her head. She traces the lines of his scars like she's done since that very first time in the woods when their breathing slowed and they didn't mention it for fear that the comfortable air between them would melt.

"Right, I got off easy and chose an older man," he laughs again, curling her closer to his side. "Did the kids go down alright?"

"After a knock on the head—" she slaps the center of his broad chest, "They were fine. Demanded three stories, but they were fine."

"Do you think Isabella's pretty?" Astrid asks after a quiet moment, as his breathing starts to slow beneath her ear and the candle on the wall burns to nothing.

"Of course she's pretty," he mutters, "but I could snap her in two. I like my women terrifying."

"You aren't scared of anything."

"Only you, love."

It takes Astrid a long time to drift off.

00000

Two days before the wedding, Astrid's mother takes the kids and she takes the chance for a long flight around the island, leaning into the wind and feeling her strength returning. She didn't gain as much weight with Arvid as her other two pregnancies, what with spending the early winter chopping wood and denying that she might be pregnant again. Two just seemed like such a magic number, she didn't want to think about a third, about expanding the house, about the future possibility of a five dragon barn. She was bursting halfway out of her tunic before Eret dragged her to the healer.

The healer laughed in her face.

If a surprise number four comes knocking though, she's chopping wood through that too. The third birth was the easiest yet, a few hours of pain and only one broken hand for Eret. A much better track record than Rolf, where she nearly shattered his wrist from gripping so hard when that first contraction consumed her.

Astrid nearly crashes when Toothless erupts from the clouds in front of her, sweeping and black and sleek like he never looks on the ground and she chases him on impulse, leaning close over Stormfly's neck and fighting not to grin as the Nadder's strong wingbeats echo her throbbing heart. Hiccup levels out eventually and she coasts up beside him, managing to be truly stern when he first glances over.

"You don't own the whole sky you know," she snaps, voice carrying over the wind and sounding higher, more girlish. He pushes his helmet back from his face and shoots her a sheepish grin.

"Well, as chief, I sort of do—"

"Playing the chief card, are you?" She laughs, throwing her head back like a challenge. "I guess it's the only one you have."

Astrid doesn't know what's gotten into her, chasing after Night Furies, poking the bear she hasn't seen in years, but it feels good and she wonders if Eret is right, if it really is a good idea to finally try and be Hiccup's friend again. He said last night that she's been happier since they started talking again, that's she's more Astrid and less mom.

And then he showed her just how much he likes Astrid.

"Night Fury card, Astrid. The card to trump all other cards."

"I suppose," she rolls her eyes and tenses her knees against Stormfly's flanks in warning, leaning forward over the Nadder's neck. "If you know how to use it."

And they're off, darting towards the nearest sea stack in an unspoken racing agreement, Toothless's dark wings a shadow in the corner of her eye. Stormfly squawks gleefully, ducking her big head and pumping forward, gaining a few yards of lead as Toothless flails out of his glide and pumps his wings to catch up.

They land on the rock at almost the same time, too close to call and Astrid flies off of the saddle, already arguing for her win, walking up to him while he messes with his helmet and gesturing towards Stormfly's hooked beak.

"By a nose, we got you by a nose. No question about it."

"Not even close," Hiccup laughs, sliding off of Toothless's saddle and stepping towards her, dropping his helmet onto a new hook on the Night Fury's gear. "We had you by a mile."

"I think all the long distance flying screwed your distance perception," she jabs a finger into his chest, and he seems shorter than she remembers, more immediate. "Because we had you there. Your dragon is great on a glide but he has no…power."

"Right, he's only the alpha dragon of the archipelago. Completely weak," he laughs and bats her hand away.

"Maybe you're just both getting old."

"And Stormfly isn't?" He asks, leaning a bit over her shoulder to look at the blue Nadder. "She's starting to look a little dingy—oof," Astrid punches him in the ribs before she can think and he stumbles backwards. Toothless catches him and nudges a little too hard against his rider's lower back, sending Hiccup forward and extra step.

His metal foot clips Astrid's toe and she swears. He apologizes and steadies himself on her shoulder, stepping off of her boot.

He looks down at her and he's right there, six inches away, looming and almost warm despite the frigid sea breeze licking around them. Astrid's heart plummets into her stomach and she clears her throat, stepping back and shrugging off his hand.

"She's not dingy. You're the one going gray," Astrid snips, stepping away to brush some dust from Stormfly's still cerulean scales.

"Isabella said I'm a silver fox," he pushes his fingers through the still thick mop and the sun picks up shades of gold along with the silver, all nestled in ruddy brown.

"At least it's not falling out, that would be a real deal breaker."

"Eret's still got a full head of hair then?"

"Full head of black hair," she laughs, but it hits somewhere deep when his face falls. She clears her throat and swings back up onto Stormfly, grunting slightly as still weak muscles almost threaten to fail her. "The gray looks fine though. Isabella is right, more silver than gray."

"Hey, it's not easy being the first one to get old. And it doesn't help that you still look twenty five," she hates the idea that he was looking. She wonders when he looked, and if he still thinks that now that he's intimately reacquainted with what twenty five actually looks like.

"I'm blushing." She deadpans, tucking slightly overgrown bangs behind her ear only to have them buffeted out immediately out by the wind.

"Lap around the island?" He asks and she thinks for a moment before shrugging her consent.

They drift low and lazy in the air currents and he tells her about his travels. He tells her about the different buildings, stone and giant, that he's seen. The gigantic ruins, ancient and crumbling. The people, how some have seven wives and ride strange horses with humps on their backs, and how others pierce holes through their faces and bodies. He tells her about the trees and how grass is just as soft everywhere else. He tells her about brilliant red clay and yellow sand and black sand by a volcano by a clear blue ocean.

She wishes she could get him to come home with her and tell Rolf, quench some of the boy's exhaustive search for knowledge, that he'd let Ingrid sit on his knee and tell her about the strong warrior women he met along the way. She wishes that she could ask, and she wishes that she couldn't see a single, persistent red hair, stuck between plates of armor and glinting in the sun.

00000

The day before the wedding, Eret stays late on his boat, pulling in fish to augment the feast. The kids are too excited to sleep initially and in a brash moment of weakness, Astrid piles them onto Stormfly with her and takes a lap around the island, vowing to comb the wind whipped tangles out of their hair in the morning. They settle easily after that, but she's wide awake, sitting at the table shockingly lonely without the baby strapped to her or tiny feet running around the hearth. The house is too quiet without Eret in it, taking up space with big shoulders and big arms and big breaths.

She feels small.

She remembers the night before her own wedding, it was late summer, the last really viable day before Autumn set in. It was a last minute sort of thing, everyone scrambling to get it together, get the bride price set and paid. She was up the entire night before sewing and packing and moving into the new lodge just finished on the outskirts of town. She didn't see Eret at all that week, because he was so busy fishing and scraping enough silver together to make it happen.

They'd only really gotten serious a month or so before, but it was very clear that they didn't want to wait a year. She wonders now if she would have wanted to hold off until the next summer, knowing that it'd take Rolf four years to show, but she doesn't think so. There's something about the flail that's so typical of her marriage, they don't take things slow, they charge and rush and fall and it would be strange if they spent a winter dancing around the subject.

Let alone five winters.

She shakes off the thought and looks down into her mug of herbal tea, swirling the mint leaves around in the dregs of hot water. The fact is, maybe it's supposed to be fast, it's supposed to be a stressful scramble, because married life only gets harder from the wedding and the hustle is there as a test. If someone isn't willing to dive into that craziness, it's just not meant to happen.

She never used to believe in fate.

Someone knocks on the door and she jumps, freezing and waiting for little feet, for the baby to cry, and sighs when all remains silent. Her chest feels heavy for the moment before she opens the door and she wonders if tonight is the night every fisherman's wife dreads, she waited up with her mother so many times wondering if it'd be her father's crew chief telling them about an accident. Her fingers glance the door and she steels herself before opening it.

It's Hiccup.

She's suddenly too bare in her shift and Eret's sweater and she crosses her arms, stepping back from the threshold.

"If—" her voice feels weak and she clears her throat. "If you're looking for the fish for the feast tomorrow, Eret was just going to deliver them to the hall when he got back."

"Eret still isn't back yet?" He almost turns to leave and Astrid wonders how her answer will make up his mind and which direction she wants his decision to go. She shakes her head and he freezes. "Can—I came to talk to you."

"What do you need to talk about?"

Astrid knows somehow that she's not going to ask him to leave, no matter what it is. He wipes sweaty palms on the side of his pants and she can't begin to imagine what the problem might be.

"Can I come in?"

"Be quiet though, kids are asleep," she steps aside and waves him in, eyes catching on the downward slant of his normally straight shoulders as he slumps into the chair at the head of the table. Eret's seat. Again.

"Do you have a drink?" He laughs and cradles his head in his hands, callused fingers curling against his scalp and finding even more gray somehow, peeking out from its hiding place.

"I have tea," she offers, pouring some still hot water from a pot on the hearth into another mug and dropping a handful of mint into it. "Do you still like honey in it?"

"Of course," he laughs miserably and pounds his fists on the table before flinching. "Sorry, noise, I forgot—I…"

"Honey?"

"Of course."

"What do you mean 'of course,' I haven't made you tea in a decade, it could have changed." She snaps for some reason, giving him a paltry amount of honey and setting the mug in front of him before sitting in her chair at the other end of the table.

"I saw Isabella in her dress. She didn't have any and they've been working on something …" his hands are shaking as he brings the mug to his lips and blows on it, taking a small scalding sip.

"And she was just that damn beautiful." She scowls at him, trying to run him off. He came here to brag, like they're suddenly going to be battle brothers and talk about women together. She doesn't know why it makes her so angry, but she wishes she could go back to her quiet evening.

"I wasn't supposed to see, Phlegma and my mom just wanted to check the hems one last time and I walked by and—and—"

"Why are you here?"

"I'm terrified." He admits, taking another cup of tea. "I'm terrified and I started walking, and I ended up here."

"That doesn't make any sense." Astrid shrugs and hugs herself tighter in the sweater that smells like her husband.

"I realized that I'd never seen her hair up before. It was off of her shoulders and I could see her neck and there was this birthmark…"

"Hiccup," she snaps and scrubs her hand over her face. "I don't care about her birthmarks."

"Neither do I." His voice breaks and her hand falls back to her lap with a dull thunk. She cocks her head and stares at him for a moment, at the strange wrinkles at the corners of his eyes, out of place on a still young face, perfect with those flecks of gray. He's two men now, the haggard chief and the boyish adventurer and she doesn't know either one, but she can't escape the air of familiarity.

She used to know part of it. She used to know part of it better than she knew herself.

"It's cold feet. It happens."

"It didn't happen to you," he scowls at her, and somehow it runs deeper than an unhelpful comment.

"I didn't have time to think."

"This wedding is even more last minute than yours." This wedding, not his wedding, this wedding.

"It's not a competition."

"Everything is a competition with you," he sets the tea down and seems to forget about it, staring through her more than at her, like the door behind her is deeply offensive. "But you won, Astrid. You won."

"Have you been drinking?" He's not making any sense and he's being too loud and she wants to kick him out.

"I wish," he laughs. "Drunk Hiccup is a lot more fun."

"I never liked him," Astrid says too quietly. "He was sort of full of himself."

"That's probably still true."

"Why are you here?" She repeats, carefully quiet so that he'll get the clue. He frowns and drums his fingers against the tables, right where Eret rests his elbows. She almost asks him to move chairs, but that would bring him closer.

"You're happy," he laughs again, nearly smacking his hand against his forehead. "Well, you're not happy right now because there's a crazy man in your house—but are you really, really happy?"

He looks desperate. She should send him home.

"What would you say if I weren't happy?" She asks it before it even fully forms in her head and only then does she see how badly she wants that answer.

"I should have married you. I had you and I—"

"Stop," she cuts him off, but she's not even really surprised. It's obvious.

"I had you, and we never—I never—"

"It wasn't right Hiccup, if it were right it would have been easier."

He pushes back from the table and stands, tugging at his hair.

"Isabella and I don't have anything to talk about. We're all out of stories. I don't even understand her half of the time, I—What am I doing? I shouldn't be getting married unless it's to you—"

"Quiet down," she hisses, standing and walking to the door, "or you can leave."

"I don't even love her, Astrid."

"How is that my problem?" she opens the door as a threat and he sighs, clearing his throat and sitting back down, taking a long sip of his tea. "If you wake the baby, he'll be fussy all night."

It's such a mundane thing to say, such a small part of a life that's not theirs, and it's suddenly so real to her that this could have been their baby. And she'd probably still be arguing with him about something. But maybe it would end like their arguments used to, with her reassurance and a kiss and—

"I'm sorry."

"And you have to stop talking like this." She puts her foot down and sets her jaw, setting her empty mug on the hearth and throwing the used leaves to steam on the coals. "I'm trying to be your friend."

"I think—We really did love each other, didn't we?"

"What did I just say?"

"Because Isabella…when she's not right in front of me, I forget about her." He stands up and takes a slow step towards her, metal foot thumping on the wood floor.

"Hiccup," she wants to move away, to open the door and shove him out, but she can't. Her hands are stuck hanging at her sides, limp and useless.

"But I never could forget about you, either you're making me furious or happy or—I feel more from remembering you than I do looking right at her."

It's everything he didn't say ten years ago. It's the last thing she wants to hear. He takes one last step and sets his palm against her cheek, warm and soft and barely there, like he's afraid she'll break. She's never had to remind Eret of her durability, she's used to bracing touches, but the ghosting touch against her cheek is anything but unfamiliar.

She gasps.

"Hiccup." It's not admonishment anymore, it's something else. A question, a reminder, a memory. His hand slides down to cup the back of her neck, fingers tangling in her hair as he pulls her against him, stepping too close and pressing his front to hers. Eret's sweater isn't thick enough to disguise all of his warmth and she stands stock still like she can resist its pull.

"This was always right, wasn't it? We were just too dumb to see it," he mutters, resting his forehead against hers. And he's so close, fitting against her so perfectly even though it's been so long. Her arm raises slowly, trembling the whole time, and wraps around his side, hand resting so cautiously against the small of his back. "See? We fit, we just fit."

"Not anymore," she winces at the words, fingers stuck to his back as though glued even as she tries to back out of the hug, jerking her head away from his and winding when his fingers snag in her hair.

He tugs her back and kisses her.

And it's anything but unfamiliar. The way that his lips curve with hers, around hers, is like walking into her favorite grove that she hasn't seen all winter. Everything is just the way she left it at the same time as being new and different and interesting. His arm curls around her waist, pressing her so close, and holding her there with tender fingers against the back of her scalp.

It's not those last few months of yelling and screaming, five years after she should have left it alone. It's not gnawing and desperate and crazy, falling into bed again when she promised herself that last time was the last time.

It's warm and welcoming and everything she didn't know she missed, earnest and as soft as when they were kids and she was so sure that she loved him. She did, she can feel it now, she knows it. She loved him like she's never loved anyone else.

She tries to push him away again, admittedly halfheartedly as he kisses her harder, sliding his tongue against her lips and through when she gasps, pouring what feels like years into the fissure between them. The hand on his shoulder doesn't shove, it relaxes, grabbing a handful of that soft hair that feels the same when her eyes are closed, tugging him closer as her mouth starts to move on his. And he groans, deep in his chest, pressing her against the sound with a hand that fists in her sweater and tugs.

His lips leave hers and dip to her neck, kissing along the line of her jaw and sucking her earlobe into his mouth as his hands move to her shoulders, shoving at her sweater and getting it halfway down her bent arms before cupping the other side of her neck and nipping down towards her collarbone, short hair tickling her still damp jaw and bringing her back to what this is, to what she's doing.

What the Hel is she doing?

"Wait, wait," she flinches away and he listens this time, hand still warm against her neck as he looks up at her, eyes black in the dim glow from the coals behind them. "I—" She looks down at the sweater stuck at her elbows, one side obscured from her view by Hiccup's long, lean arm. His hand is still shaking, trembling against the side of her neck, and she can't look at the sweater anymore, can't look at what it means. She lets it fall to the floor and kicks it aside with a burst of adrenalinethat leaves her nauseous. "Don't leave a mark, E—he never—"

He cuts her off with a kiss distracting enough to let her forget what she's doing , hands finding her waist through the thin fabric of her shift, gripping so gently, thumbs ticklish against the front of her waist. His hands fit perfectly into the curve of her waist,even though it's different than when they were together, years and three kids later. He doesn't notice or doesn't comment, dragging her after him towards the bedroom door with a ohis metal leg thunking on the wooden floor in a clumsy, asymmetrical rhythm.

"Astrid," he sighs against her lips as he reaches for the handle and she freezes, pulling away enough to look at him. Still desperate, hands latched into her like she's trying to escape, like he wants to hold onto her this time.

"Not in there," she pulls him back away from the door, away from the bed that she can't soil, towards the living room and glances at the fizzling torch. She won't relight it, if he lets go the trance will be broken and somehow, no matter how horrible this is going to feel tomorrow, how awful it's going to be in an hour, she doesn't want it to break. "The baby," she explains needlessly and he frowns, remembering it's not his baby and she's not his.

His hand slides down to her thigh, rucking up her shift and slipping underneath it, bypassing awkwardness as it follows a practiced, ticklish path up her leg to the curve of her waist. She moans and leans in to kiss him, struck with that sudden, odd rightness as her tongue slips past crooked teeth and tangles with his.

The torch fizzles out and leaves behind only the orange glow of the barely crackling fire, and she's lost.

Her hands fly to the hem of his shirt and yank upwards, making it all the way to his armpits in one fell swoop, and he laughs against her lips, that wonderful husky sound she's missed so much. This has always been a laughing thing for them, funny and frank and sweet, nothing like…anything since. She jerks again at his shirt, growling into him when he chuckles again, thumb swiping at the underside of her breast and sending shivers down her spine.

"Just a second—"

"Now," she growls, holding back a foreign whimper when his hand leaves her for long enough to get the shirt the rest of the way over his head. Her lands latch back onto the bare skin, coasting up thin familiar plains covered in new scars. He moans at the touch, pulling her back to his lips and hissing when her fingernails dig into the tender flesh, raking back down and pausing in the thin sprinkling of hair across his chest.

His hand falls to her shoulder and tugs the strap of her shift aside, ducking his head to kiss across the point of her arm, treating each inch of skin as something special, flicking his tongue into the well of her collarbone as she reaches between them for the ties of his pants, fingers trembling against the drawstring. He brushes the other sleeve of her shift off and it falls to the ground, tickling against the sides of her calves.

She holds her breath.

"Gods, you're beautiful," he mutters against the side of her neck, cupping her breast with one careful hand, gently stroking her skin and tingling in special, neglected places she'd forgotten about entirely. He ghosts across her stomach with gentle fingers, tugging her against him by her waist and she turns her head to nip at his lip, sucking it into her mouth. His pants finally come loose and she pushes them down over his hips, stopping to grab his ass out of long lost habit. He jumps and laughs into her mouth, sliding two hands down her back and mimicking her, callused fingertips digging into her skin.

"What?" She snickers as he massages the handfuls of flesh, hand sliding down his chest to grab him, already half hard and sending warm sparks through her arm. He moans and kisses her temple, stepping out of his boot and pants with a slight stumble and squeezing her rear one last time before grabbing her waist and urging her towards the floor.

"You started it," he accuses, humorous twinkle fading from his eyes as he lays her back on the bear skin rug and kneels beside her, hand sweeping along her extended side and hitting at least half a dozen sensitive spots that arch her off of the fur towards him, into him. Always back into him, no matter what.

She pumps him slowly with a loose fist, re-familiarizing herself with knobs and ridges, rediscovering what isn't so foreign after all, biting her lip and tugging him towards her. On top of her. He's still shaking, thin wiry muscles in his chest twitching and trembling as he holds himself over her, orange light catching the gray in his hair and lighting it on fire, red and gold and umber.

Like his fiancée's hair.

He ducks down and kisses her cheek, wetting his lips with a tear she hadn't noticed and reaching up to push her hair out of her eyes. She tugs him between her legs, heel hooking all the way around his narrow back as he rests his forehead against hers.

"We shouldn't," she mutters, another tear leaking onto her temple. He kisses it away and nuzzles her cheek, sliding his hand down between her legs and finding the spot too quickly, rubbing with careful, tight strokes. She arches up against him, heel digging in and nudging the tip of him against her. They both sigh at the contact, Astrid's fingernails digging into his shoulder.

"I don't want—I'll never regret this," he mutters insistently into her ear, pinching that delicate bundle of nerves and swallowing her near desperate moan.

"Go," she squints her eyes shut and nods, wrapping both arms around his shoulders and holding him close, pressing him into her with her calf around his hips. He groans and pushes in the rest of the way, hand sliding down to cup her hip and angling it against him, burying his face in her shoulder.

"Gods, Astrid," he mumbles, still trembling with the sensation and rocking against her with shallow, searching thrusts, positioning and adjusting. She kisses his shoulder, hooking her ankles together behind his thighs and pulling him deeper.

"Go," she repeats, moaning as he pulls out so slowly and pushes back in, acclimating and sweet, and her toes curl against him as she arches off of the fur. He does it again, hips shaking as he draws it out, stroking against everything inside of her. His lips are a damp point of heat against her neck and he kisses the spot, nibbling on the skin before she reminds him not to leave a mark with a pinch on the shoulder. "Come on."

"I want it to last," he pants in her ear, falling into a slow, smooth rhythm, too much and not enough all at once. Building and flowing and changing inside of her. "I want to remember how you feel, how you sound—" she kisses him not at all gently, lips hurting against the bruising pressure of her teeth as her cheeks moisten, slick tears smudged between their faces. He nips her lip and she moans, raking her fingernails down his back and not caring if she leaves marks.

He pulls away to kiss her forehead, her cheeks, her chin, rhythm quickening as he reaches between them, unsteady and charmingly erratic braced against one arm as he rubs that sensitive spot between her legs, remembering what she needs, panting against her hair. She beats him there, arching against him and crying out as it's finally enough, squinted shut eyes squeezing out a few more confused tears. Her hand falls slack against his spine and she nuzzles his temple almost habitually, acting out a snippet of some mostly forgotten memory, and he spasms, hips sinking deep and locking against hers like a puzzle piece, a perfectly tight fit.

He sags on top of her, head angled away from the almost faded firelight and the moon makes gray streaks glow, silver and accusatory in the panting silence. The band on Astrid's left hand is suddenly scalding and she goes stiff, remembering who and where and when she is, the kids in the next room, the bear fur against her rubbed raw shoulders. Hiccup kisses her temple, her cheek, the corner of her lips, groaning almost happily to himself, like he's not crumbling inside.

She guesses he's not.

"Shit," she swears, pushing on his shoulders until he rolls off of her and standing on wobbly legs, scooping her crumpled shift off of the floor and yanking it over her head. She's not covered enough, not hidden like she should have stayed, and she retrieves the incriminating sweater, shoving her hands through the sleeves and holding it closed across her front. "Shit. Shit. Shit."

"Astrid—" She picks up his pants and throws them at him, followed by his shirt.

"You have to go, you have to go now."

"Astrid—" He tries again, standing and struggling into his pants.

"Out. You have to go!" She's too loud and Arvid coughs to life in the next room. She swears and glowers at Hiccup, pausing for a second to see if the baby will fall back asleep on his own, but the sniff falls into a wail and she spits out her goodbye. "Leave, really. I can't have you here." She ducks back out of the room a moment later, bouncing Arvid against her hip and brushing that black shock of hair against his head.

Hiccup is still there, fully dressed and pleading, eyes wide under mussed hair that makes him look young and confused. She stalks around him to the door, pointing at it while she's gently shushing the baby's crying. He crosses the room and standing in front of her, back absolutely straight and emanating more chief than Hiccup.

"Astrid, you can't tell me that you didn't feel that."

"Feel what?" She challenges him, unflinching as he grips her shoulders, hands bracing and warm. Unwelcome.

"That was…" he leans down too close and she refuses eye contact, staring over his shoulder at the bedroom door, still hanging ajar. "I never could stop loving—"

"Stop."

"You have to feel it too," he tightens his grip, cutting Arvid out of the conversation entirely and she shrugs his hands off, looking up at him with blazingly furious.

"So what if I do? What then?" She holds Arvid closer, his sleepy head falling against her chest. "I'm married, Hiccup. It's too late, I—Do you understand what you're saying? You're asking me to take my kids back, and—I love Eret—"

"You feel it too," he repeats, face cracked wide open like he's fifteen and abandoned.

They managed something stupid and crazy this time.

"So what?" She stands strong, quickly wiping a few dribbling tears that escape. Damn hormones, damn dust in the air. Damn Hiccup.

"What now?" He asks quietly, holding his hand towards her like she could take it, like she has some impossible choice.

"You're getting married tomorrow."

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	3. Chapter 3

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Hiccup's wedding went off without a hitch, or so Astrid heard. She didn't go, claiming honest fatigue and spending the night with Rolf and Arvid while Ingrid eagerly assumed position as Eret's date. No one really saw the chief or his bride the next few peaceful weeks, unless the bottom of their feet and their dragons count for anything.

Astrid doesn't see much of him after he comes out of blissful hiding either, devoting early autumn afternoons to accumulating the largest wood stack that their small house can store. Eret offers to build a larger shelter for it, but she tells him that he's done enough and that he's wonderful.

And that she made his favorite stew for dinner.

00000

Three months later, when it's snowing lightly and Arvid is a chubby, happy baby who can hurl a wooden ball clear across the room, he starts refusing milk. At first it's a strange blip in the routine, but after a few days of screaming and not much food, Astrid visits the healer to get a professional opinion. The woman listens, stirring something in a pot near her hearth before ladling a while concoction into a skin and holding it to Arvid's mouth. Astrid is impossibly relieved when the baby starts eating voraciously, chubby cheeks puffing and squelching with the effort of swallowing so quickly.

"What is that? What is he eating?" She accepts the infant and the skin, angling it carefully above his blissful face, blue eyes shut tight.

"Yak's milk," the healer grins and hands her two small bags of herbs. "You're pregnant, lassie."

"What?" Astrid's heart drops into her stomach. "But I haven't felt anything, no nausea, my clothes are looser." She shakes her head. "How far along could I be?"

"For the milk to go sour?" The woman weighs imaginary weights in her hands, "two, three months."

Three months.

Three months.

"But…but I've always had nausea by two months. With the other three I was puking my guts out!"

"This one is going easy on you then. Every baby is different," Astrid swallows hard, wondering just how different this baby could be as the woman describes Arvid's new yak milk regimen and the pouches of anti-nausea herbs.

Three months. It had to be three months, didn't it?

Of course it could still be fine. She and Eret—they—Honestly, they've been busier than normal, combined guilt and doting scratching out the memory of that night as much as she could. It's probably fine, one drop in the pot won't poison the soup.

Probably.

Unless you get a bad bite.

She didn't think her cycle was even starting again yet.

That night, Rolf and Ingrid are at their grandma's, staying for dinner after playing there for the afternoon and letting Astrid go to the healers', and the house is almost quiet. Eret asks about the yak milk as he sits down with his bowl of stew, and Astrid's pleasant smile freezes on her face, twitching before fading completely.

"What?" He presses the issue and she shrugs, biting her lip and looking down at Arvid. "Did the healer say that something is wrong? Is it—"

"I'm pregnant," she blurts, panicking at the broad grin already spreading across his face. "I slept with Hiccup."

"What?" He's not mad, he's pensive, taking in the situation before deciding how to react.

"It was a mistake—"

"When?" As if it matters, as if she could say ten years ago and fix everything.

"The night before his wedding," she admits. "He came over and he was having cold feet and saying things he shouldn't have been saying and—but it's my fault, all my fault. I shouldn't have let him in and I shouldn't have let him kiss me and—" his head drops to the table and he yanks at his thick, black braid, white knuckled fists falling against the wood. "It was a mistake and I haven't seen him since and I—I'm sorry."

She's crying again, and at least she can wholly blame this one on the hormones, her hands frozen on Arvid and the skin, wincing every time the baby's eager swallow drowns out the pained silence.

"Say something." The tears trickle down an absolutely stony face as her chest goes cold. "Just—"

"It was once?" He doesn't look at her but she nods anyway.

"And I never want to see him again, I—"

"I know how he affects you, you were half mad when I pulled you away from all of that. From him. And you just seemed happy to have your friend back but he was…," Eret stands up from the table and paces, clenching and unclenching tight fists.

"It was my fault, I'm married to you."

"And he just fell into you then? He came here to tell you about his cold feet," Eret shakes his head, staring at her and the baby like they're smoke, like they're going to float away in the wind.

"Never again," she shakes her head, setting the empty skin aside and holding Arvid up to burp him, unflinching when a dribble of frothy, warm milk dribbles down her shoulders. "And it—it's probably fine, I—No matter what, it's yours, I don't want it to be anyone's but yours."

"It will be mine," he nods, resolute and staring at her. "You're taking the blame but you don't see how you are around him. You don't know how he affects—"

"He doesn't have any effect on me at all," Astrid insists, but it sounds as weak as it feels and she backs away from the fight she can't win. "It's yours. No matter what, you don't have to forgive me, it's yours."

"I forgive you," he affirms without hesitation, lip curling ferociously. "But I don't forgive him."

"He's the chief."

"And he needs my fish."

"Eret," she sighs, resting a shocked, trembling hand against his chest, over the scar in that place he doesn't let anyone else touch. He stands there for a moment, almost proud enough to stay mad and shrug off the touch, but his hand floats up to cover hers, pressing her touch to him. "What do you say to naming this one Eret?"

"You don't have to do that?" He shakes his head, barely meeting her gaze.

"No, I like the name Eret. Obviously."

"What if it's a girl?" He shuffles a little closer to her and Arvid lets out a little burp, turning to wave a bobbling, chubby arm towards his dad and tracing a long blue tattoo. It feels like family, and it's right. It's terrifying and she wonders what's lurking inside of her, waiting to pounce.

"Ereta. Rhymes with Greta, it could work." He snorts and squeezes her hand.

"Ereta, daughter of Eret."

"Let's start assuming Eret, son of Eret." She nods, and his smile returns bit by bit. "Well, Eret, son of Eret, son of Eret."

Eret III.

But she doesn't mention that she knows another Third who hates it.

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Nine months isn't really long enough to prepare for something like this, but Astrid can't say she's exactly shocked when the healer hands her the wiped clean baby, bright red hair glimmering in the spring light.

Stoick red hair.

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Eret son of Eret, son of Eret is three when the chief's extra gifts finally strike a nerve. It's not fair to the older kids, it's not fair to the new heir, that baby girl with the already long brown hair, tangled and hanging to her petite shoulders. Hiccup shows up too late one night, obviously trying to catch Astrid alone, like he always does, new leather terror harness in hand like his plan of getting the boy a terror isn't at least a few years from being feasible.

Eret answers the door, already fed up from a too long day and tells the chief to leave, utterly unenamored with the prospect of saying no again.

"It's for Eret," Hiccup insists, edging his shoulder through the threshold, looking solely at Astrid as she does her best to ignore him, wiping the same clean surface with a rag until he looks back to her husband. "The Eret who's interested," he amends with a winning smile and Astrid double checks the shut door on the younger boy's bedroom, hoping that they don't wake him up. He's hard to get to sleep anyway, he won't stop chattering if his life depends on it.

"Not interested, chief."

"It's for him," Hiccup continues, holding the present out towards Astrid. She shoots him a glare, scoffing and storming back to the hearth over that bear skin rug, still soft and cushy under her feet. Mocking her every single day under Eret Junior's crafty little hands, building block towers to the sky.

"He's three," Eret Senior, steps back to close the door.

"Never too early—"

"Hiccup, stop. No dragons yet," Astrid interjects, voice pointedly hushed as she steps up beside her husband, immediately regretting the 'yet'. "If we need something, we'll commission it from Gobber like everyone else."

"It's a present," Hiccup insists, speaking only to her, and Eret's arm falls around her shoulders, tugging her into his side. Hiccup flexes his jaw and she glares back. "Astrid—"

"You can give your kids dragons whenever you want," Astrid flinches when the fire lights up behind his eyes again, chiefly and formidable.

"That is my son, Astrid," he snaps, shoving the halter into her hands and gritting his teeth. "That is our son—"

"Get out of my house," Eret grips the edge of the door so tightly it creaks in his hand and Astrid tries to hand back the halter even as Hiccup flares up red and furious.

"He's our son, it's obvious. The whole village can see it, I—"

"Get. Out. Of. My. House," Eret grits through his teeth, glaring at that single metal foot on the inside of the threshold.

"Hiccup, go." Astrid shakes her head and steps away from the door, glare fizzling into something soft and sad as he looks at her like he used to look at her, like he looked at her that night when everything changed for the worse.

"Astrid—"

Eret slams the door, leaning against it and staring straight ahead while Hiccup knocks on the other side, less and less polite until he gives up entirely with a two fisted slam. Astrid watches as her husband wipes a hand over his face, impossibly more drained. She steps up and rests a hand on his shoulder, fingers small against the breadth of his shoulder.

"Son of Eret, remember?" She nods at him carefully, sighing and leaning forward to rest her forehead against his chest, almost fitting but coming up ever so slightly short.

"Son of Eret."

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**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Now, can I propose something? I'm going to anyway.
> 
> I'm absolutely writing a story centered around Eret son of Eret son of Eret, the Hiccstrid lovechild. I guess it's more of an announcement than a proposal. It won't be done for a while, but if you're still with me and you're not too horribly broken to continue, it's something to go read. 
> 
> All current parts are on tysonrunningfox.tumblr.com under the Fester & Eret III link...but I also might post them here, I have not decided yet. But they exist on tumblr.


End file.
